I was so excited the first time I received notification that I was going to be included in Who’s Who. I mean, what an honor, right. Who’s Who, for heavens sake. It meant recognition and notoriety and ... well, good stuff. I read the fine print and was getting ready to write the check for a copy of the book, and a check for the framed notice and a check for ... it was the third charge that tipped me off. I’m slow, but not that slow. It wasn't an honor, it was a scam. A moneymaking enterprise that played off everyone’s inner desire to be someone, to be recognized. You got listed in this book that no one would see unless they had shelled out the cash to get one of their own. Your achievements were the ones you listed in the form provided. It was a way of tooting your own horn and paying someone for the privilege of doing so.
We all want to be remembered. To accomplish some great feat, or create some great work of art, we want to perform a rescue, or invent a cure. We want our lives to have meaning, and that is only when we accomplish something. Only? Well, intellectually we know better. But our guts tell us that we are defined by what we do. Who we are is what we do. Right?
No. Not right. At least not according to Easter. At least as Mark portrays it. Take a look.
Mark 16:1-8 When the sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him. 2 And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. 3 They had been saying to one another, "Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?" 4 When they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled back. 5 As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man, dressed in a white robe, sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed. 6 But he said to them, "Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him. 7 But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you." 8 So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.
Most scholars agree that this is the original ending of the Gospel of Mark. Verses nine through twenty were added later, on at least two different times. Probably because the church was uncomfortable with the original ending. “And they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.” Kind of a damp squib of an ending. A what? Is that an idiom used over here. I get confused. A damp squib. It means a dud, a firework that didn't go off. A sputter instead of an explosion.
You’d think resurrection calls for fireworks at the end, wouldn't you. A big, wide-screen, special effects kind of moment. Filmed in “Vista-Vision!” In “Technicolor!” In Hi Def, three D! But no, we get “they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.”
And who are the they in this case? Well, the women, who went to do something. At least they tried to do something, to care for the dead body. To anoint him, Mark says, forgetting that he was already anointed back in chapter fourteen, by an unnamed woman with an alabaster jar. Maybe it was Mary. Mary Magdalene, or Mary who was Martha’s sister or some other Mary, the mother of James, perhaps, Jesus mom maybe. There were just too many Marys. Mark couldn't keep them straight, no wonder we get confused. And Salome? Wasn't that Herod’s daughter who danced a dance that won her a prophet’s head? Surely not. Another Salome. Thought to be the mother of James and John, Zebedee’s wife. Mother of James? Isn't that Mary? Or is it a different James? Arghh. We need a cast list. We don’t know who’s who in this story. We know what they did. Or didn't do. Or tried to do. Don’t we?
They intended to anoint the body, to prepare it for burial. The practice was actually to aid in the decay process. The spices were to help with the smell, but also to accelerate the decomposition. Bodies would like in the tomb for a year and then the family would go and collect the bones and put them in a box, called an ossuary, that would be stored in a different section of the tomb. So, when Joseph loaned his family’s tomb to the family of Jesus, it was only supposed to be temporary. But little did he know.
They said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid. It was what they didn't do that Mark was interested in. They didn't anoint the body because there wasn't a body to anoint. So they were given a different task by the young man in the tomb. A young man who seems eerily familiar. A young man in a garden tomb reminds us of a young man in a garden of violence and betrayal. And yet that young man ran off without clothes and this young man was dressed in white. That young man was scared to death, this young man was filled the confidence of life eternal. He’s not here, look see that empty spot? He has been raised. He wasn't interested in tombs, but in what came out of one. Or rather who came out of one. Who’s who? We aren't introduced to this young man, because it isn't his story. He’s a pointer, a reference to another. He’s not here.
But go and tell his disciples. A new mission was given. They came with one task and they didn't do it. They couldn't. It was no longer necessary. The things of death are no longer necessary. The attitude of death, the victory of death was no longer. So, a new mission was needed. Go and tell his disciples, and Peter.
And Peter? They had to blink at that. The last we saw Peter he was collapsed, sobbing in the courtyard of the high priest’s house. The last we heard from Peter he was spouting curses and swearing oaths that he didn't have clue who this Jesus person was. The last we knew of Peter he was condemned by a rooster crowing in the dawn of a terrible day. The worst day of Peter’s life. And he knew he had failed. Failed to keep his word, that he had so vehemently declared mere hours before that damnable rooster. “Even if I must die with you, I will not deny you!” And die he did. Inside, in his soul, in his sense of self. Who’s who Peter? Who’s you? Nobody, that’s who.
But now, “go and tell his disciples, and Peter.” What did Peter do to deserve this? What did he do? Nothing. What did the women do? The said nothing to anyone for they were afraid. Nothing. What did any of them do to make this Easter moment happen? Nothing. What do any of us do to deserve Easter? Nothing. What do we do to receive Easter? Nothing. Who’s Who in the Easter story? Not them. Not us. Only Him.
And Mark doesn't even have Jesus appear in this original ending. Jesus doesn't pop up from behind a rolled away stone and shout surprise. He doesn't encounter anyone wander in the garden. It is just a presence. No, a Presence. He’s not here. He will meet you though. He will meet you where you live. He’s already there, ahead of you. Get moving. Get going, or Easter will go on without you.
That’s what we do on Easter. We run to catch up. We run to find the one who has gone before us. The one who was raised for us. What did we do to make Easter happen? Nothing. What did we do to deserve such a gift, such a moment? Nothing. What can we do to stop it or to make it better? Nothing. Easter is. Easter was and is and always will be. And we did nothing.
That’s Mark’s way of telling the story. It isn't our story. It isn't our doing. It is God. God is the actor. God is the doer. We barely appear. And those who represent us doing do so well in their doing either. It isn't a human story, it’s a divine one. It isn't our story. And yet. And yet.
Who’s who in Easter? Why we are. We are someone because of Easter. We are who we are not by our doing but by the grace of God. We are made new, not because we earned it, but because God gives it. We have hope, not because we are strong enough to work it, or respond to it, or claim it. We have hope because God gives it. And because the resurrected Jesus leads us home. You will see him, he told you that, remember? You will see him. And in seeing him you will know who’s who.
Shalom,
Derek
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